


nothing without you

by thetealord



Series: doe eyes and lies [7]
Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Depression, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Mental Breakdown, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-01
Updated: 2017-05-01
Packaged: 2018-10-26 01:31:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 872
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10776654
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thetealord/pseuds/thetealord
Summary: When Cor woke up that morning, he could feel it. It was gone.





	nothing without you

**Author's Note:**

> this is terrible, uh... sorry ='D
> 
> title from [vienna teng's "nothing without you"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yUJvrqSbXIU)
> 
> _It's the quiet night that breaks me,_   
>  _I cannot stand the sight of this familiar place._
> 
> _It's the quiet night that breaks me,_   
>  _like a dozen paper-cuts that only I can trace._

When Cor woke up that morning, he could feel it. It was gone.

He grabbed his phone, he could barely breathe. It had been six months and every day, he could feel it slowly fading away until. This.

“Monica,” he said, throat tight, when she picked up the phone. She sounded tired, but when he said her name, she prompted him, concern lacing her voice. But all he could say was her name again, stuttering, and the sobs were already building up in his throat.

“Oh no,” she said. “I’m coming, don’t move. I’ll be there in five minutes.”

Before the dawn, they’d lived together, but afterwards, he’d needed his own space again, to mourn and try to live on his own. She’d kept the key, though, and he’d told her and Iris and their friends the whole truth. Told them who Ardyn was, what he’d done, what he was really like… and they’d believed him. They were hesitant, at first, but with all that had happened, they’d pitied him, too, because he’d lost another king, so soon after the first. And Monica knew more than any of them that it was only a matter of time before he couldn’t keep up his cool, collected charade any longer. It was only a matter of months before he called upon her again.

And this was it.

She found him still in bed. He’d barely registered the door opening, after staring at the ceiling for five minutes that felt like five hours. It was the same apartment, the same bed he’d shared with Ardyn for so many years. Monica had tried to get him to move out, to move on, but he’d refused, clung to that place they’d shared tooth and nail, because as long as he stayed, it was like Ardyn was still there, and he could continue to believe that he might arrive at any moment, that he would show up without warning, in his kitchen or in his bed.

Now, he didn’t know what to feel. He just felt… empty.

Monica dragged him upright and he curled against her like a child, shirtless and cold and alone.

“Cor,” she said, stroking his hair with gentle fingers. In all the years she’d known him, she’d never seen him like this. “What is it?” She knew, but she also knew that she had to get it out of him, had to get him to speak the words.

“It’s gone,” he said after a long moment.

“What is?”

“His—,” he choked on the words, pressed his face into her lap. “His magic,” and the sobs were there, building up. “It’s finally gone.” As soon as he got it out, that single admission, that Ardyn was _gone_ , that he would _never_ come back, he finally hit that breaking point, and cried, cried more than he ever had when the sun came up again. His sobs were horrific, distraught wails, his shoulders shaking with them even as Monica stroked his back. He soaked her jeans with tears, clutched her shirt and the sheets, and every time he nearly stopped crying, he’d remember something, something about him, and it started all over again. That gift, the warmth of Ardyn’s magic still flowing through him even after his King had died, had helped him hold on for so long. He didn’t know what to do without it.

Monica was patient. She couldn’t even imagine how it must be, to have lost Ardyn, too, after losing Regis only ten years before. And Ardyn had meant so much more to him. That, she didn’t think she would ever understand, but she could see it in Cor’s eyes and she remembered seeing it in Altum’s, too, when they looked at each other. Cor had been more deeply in love than he’d ever wanted to admit to anyone else excpet, certainly, Ardyn himself. And Ardyn had loved Cor. Even if she couldn’t approve of anything else he’d done to meet his ends, she had to thank him for that.

It was maybe an hour or more before Cor was finally calm, before he’d cried himself dry, and was just a sniffly, depressed puddle in her lap.

“I want to be dead,” he told her, frankly, voice still thick and hoarse from crying. “I want to be with him.”

“I know,” she said quietly, soothing him. “But we need you here, Cor. Besides, you have work to do for him, and you need to be alive for that.”

“I know.” He sniffled. “I miss him.”

“Of course you do.” She sighed and smiled, combing his hair through her fingers. “Of course you do, Cor. You’ll _always_ miss him.”

“Yeah.” He clutched her knee, holding tight to her still. He couldn’t have done this alone, she knew that.

“He’ll be waiting for you,” she assured him a moment later. “You know he will.”

“What if he’s not?” he said, nearly cried again, but then, for the first time in a long while, smiled a little instead. “He was always restless.”

“Cor,” she said plainly. “I know love when I see it. He’ll be waiting. Trust me.”

He fell quiet. Because, she was right. He would be. Cor had to trust that he would be.


End file.
